Best festival, period

Don’t bring a pet to the North Country Fair. If you do, “you will be turned away at the gate,” says the warning on the NCF website.
One would think there are worse things than having your doggie with you, but of course pets can cause problems in close quarters and there must have been some for such a stark warning to appear on the main page.
Also on the NCF home page – the claim by Fish Griwkowsky of the Edmonton Sun – made years ago – that the North Country Fair is the best music festival, period.
Does he still think that? Yes he does!
“I’ll argue anyone into the dirt about it,” he says in an email to The Leader, “and the lineup this year looks especially tight for the big anniversary. Pay special attention to the Mariaichi Ghost, the Hearts and Raven She Hollers, and of course wherever the moon tells you to wander.”
The 40th annual NCF goes June 22 – 24 at the Driftpile Valley location. The line-up contains some familiar names – Captain Thunderpants and Dana Wylie (seen playing keyboards at the Legacy Centre for one of the artists in the Stage North concert series this past winter) will be there with her own band. Colin Linden is back (another Stage North Performer). So is Fred Eaglesmith, the very witty, very talented singer/songwriter from Guelph Ontario, last seen performing in a frigid downpour at the old North Country Fair site at Joussard. Morgan Davis and Roy Forbes (the artist formerly known as ‘Bim’) are back again as well. Russell deCarle of ‘Prairie Oyster’ fame is on the list, as is good old Scott Cook, probably just back from an Australian summer of touring Down Under. Cook performed in Slave Lake in the 2016/17 Stage North season and it’s fair to say made a fair-sized impression.